Citizen Local

Process

Client

Description

A mobile app that would make it easier for people to participate in the political process at the local level, where impacts tend to be more immediate and visible.

UX Research & Design

I interviewed and surveyed a variety of people and did a competitive analysis of websites and apps. I organized the responses into an affinity map to determine commonality.

Research Insights

People want to engage in politics without getting burned out. They want to focus on actions with the most impact.

A handful of apps help people voice support or opposition and follow what’s happening nationally, but there are none that do that locally.

Most people do not follow local politics, even though they want to and their actions there could have more of an impact.

Personas

Passionate Millennial

Elizabeth PenaI want to find out about local legislation, but I don't know where to look, and it's overwhelming sifting through government sites.

Working Mom

Kris WhitakerAdded to my long to-do list is holding reps accountable and finding out what can be done locally.

Experience Design

I developed an app map, user stories and flows, prioritized features based on analyzing effort vs. impact and to determine a minimally viable product for user testing.

App Map

Flow 1

Flow 2

Flow 3

Wireframes

With a few clicks, users can quickly contact their state legislators or look up legislation to get more information and contact bill sponsors to voice support or opposition.

Home

Your Legislators

Rep Detail

Find Legislation

Legislation Detail

Prototype

I developed a prototype and conducted preliminary user testing. From interviews and discussions, I confirmed a key component—connecting meaningful issues with legislation—for focus in the next iteration as well as potential secondary users—organizers and organizations that could connect with a base of support for legislation and lend credibility or support to legislation.

With prototyping I can continue to iterate to get to a viable proof of concept with less effort to secure funding and support for future development.